Guardians trying to navigate a turbulent, emotional new world

Sunday

Mar 17, 2013 at 2:00 AM

But as they tried to negotiate this new world of parenting, they found some small measure of comfort in the numbers of caregivers like themselves. They particularly have been helped by the Cornell Cooperative Extension's Relatives as Parents Program that serves hundreds of the more than 4,000 nonparents raising nearly 6,000 children in Orange County alone.

In fact, one of every 11 kids in New York state, or about 300,000 children, is at some point being raised by an adult who isn't a parent, according to statistics compiled from the U.S. census by AARP and Jerry Wallace, who heads New York's Kinship Navigator, a statewide program run by the Catholic Family Network that provides information and referral services for kinship caregivers. That's an increase of 18 percent over the past decade. For African-Americans, the percentage of kids being raised by adults who aren't their parents is even higher – 1 of about 5, Wallace says.

The reasons the original parents of the children can't – or won't – care for them include many of the same ones that caused Cameron's parents to lose him, including substance abuse, mental illness, physical abuse and money troubles.

STEVE ISRAEL

The last thing 69-year- old Ray Macur thought he'd be doing today is raising a 9-year-old boy.

Just a few years ago, Macur, a widower, was planning to marry the pretty widowed woman he'd met at the Pine Bush Stewart's where she worked and he had coffee every morning. But one August day nearly two years ago, Ray's grown son in the state of Florida called.

“They took Cameron away,” said the son, who, after one of his many bouts of alcohol abuse had left his child – Ray's grandchild – alone yet again. Cameron's mother couldn't care for the boy because she had her own problems, which is why she's now homeless.

Next, Macur got a call from a social services agency. “Would you be Cameron's guardian?” is the question he heard.

Ray Macur and his fiancee, Barbara Howland, 57, are two of the more than 6,500 local grandparents, aunts, uncles or other grown-ups in Ulster, Orange and Sullivan counties acting as parents for the more than 9,000 kids who are being raised by adults other than their parents.

“And all of a sudden our world changed,” says Macur, a retired sheet metal worker whose second marriage is on hold while he and Howland raise Cameron and try to negotiate a new life that brings new challenges every day.

So instead of a carefree trip to Oklahoma and relaxing with their grandkids, Macur and Howland must deal with the occasionally turbulent mix of anger, fear and confusion of Cameron, who, like thousands of other kids, suddenly has new “parents,” even though their real parents are still alive. Some of these kids may only know how to express that turbulence with violence – by throwing a plant, flipping a mattress or overturning furniture, which is what Cameron did just a few weeks after arriving in Pine Bush, bringing tears to the eyes of Macur and Howland.

And then, after Howland called her grown daughter for advice, the thin, bright boy with a talent for art became even more fearful.

“He thought I was calling the police,” she says, “because anytime something bad had happened with his parents in Florida, the police would take him away.”

And now, instead of “just” dealing with their own aches and pains, they now must worry about Cameron's childhood ailments, like attention deficit disorder, and how to pay for them, and whether they, as nonparents, are even authorized to get Cameron treatment.

But as they tried to negotiate this new world of parenting, they found some small measure of comfort in the numbers of caregivers like themselves. They particularly have been helped by the Cornell Cooperative Extension's Relatives as Parents Program that serves hundreds of the more than 4,000 nonparents raising nearly 6,000 children in Orange County alone.

In fact, one of every 11 kids in New York state, or about 300,000 children, is at some point being raised by an adult who isn't a parent, according to statistics compiled from the U.S. census by AARP and Jerry Wallace, who heads New York's Kinship Navigator, a statewide program run by the Catholic Family Network that provides information and referral services for kinship caregivers. That's an increase of 18 percent over the past decade.

For African-Americans, the percentage of kids being raised by adults who aren't their parents is even higher – 1 of about 5, Wallace says. Barbara Howland and her fiance, Ray Macur, are raising his grandson, Cameron Macur, center. Cameron plays with his cousin, Noah Didonato, at Macur's home in Pine Bush. Photo: TOM BUSHEY/Times Herald-RecordThe reasons the original parents of the children can't – or won't – care for them include many of the same ones that caused Cameron's parents to lose him, including substance abuse, mental illness, physical abuse and money troubles.

“There's been a particular upsurge during the economic downturn,” says Wallace, who notes that even as the problem grows, money for programs like RAPP are still losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in state funding – putting some of those local programs at risk.

The problems facing folks like Macur and Howland are so common, it didn't take long for them to discover others dealing with the same issues.

Take the upper-middle-class childless couple in their 50s who were enjoying a life of traveling until one Sunday night when their three grandnieces and -nephews – ages 10, 8 and 2 – were literally dropped off at their Orange County home. Their father was in jail. Their mother had died.

The 2-year-old had been so traumatized after her parents had left the house and locked her in a room with only a cat, she had to be held in a blanket as she screamed and scratched out the boiling brew of emotions she couldn't express any other way.

At RAPP, Macur and Howland also met the grandmother who at 5 a.m. last May answered her doorbell to find her daughter handing over two of her grandchildren, 10 and 6, because, the daughter said, “I can't take this anymore.”

Then there was the grandmother of the little girl whose 18-year-old mom just decided that a life of working and caring for her child wasn't for her – or the father who had long since left.

Regardless of the specific situation, just about all the children and their caregivers face so many challenges, they need a program like RAPP to help navigate them – and provide the emotional support that comes from knowing they and the children are not alone.

Many of those problems stem from a legal system that seems stacked against nonparents raising children – or, more precisely, for the rights of the parent.

“The legal challenges can be absolutely overwhelming,” says Goshen attorney Nicole Mariani who helps nonparents negotiate the legal system. “In New York state, parents have a constitutional right to care and custody of their children. It doesn't matter that a grandparent can provide a better home. If a parent can provide the basic shelter, food, medical care and education, as they long as they're providing the minimum, they can parent.”

This is why many nonparents live in constant fear of a knock on the door from a parent who suddenly decides he wants a child back, and says, “I have a court order.”

“These kids have lost their parents, but what's worse is their parents are still around,” says Brenda Reynolds, RAPP program coordinator in Orange County.

And even though these nonparents can receive a government subsidy of about $400 per month for raising a child – if they know about it – once they adopt a child, as many nonparents do, they lose that money.

Then there's a health care system that's also often stacked against the nonparents. A little girl with spina bifida couldn't immediately get the operation she needed to get out of her little stroller because her nonparents didn't have the right papers – and because her condition wasn't life threatening.

This is why many nonparents raising kids often carry custody papers wherever they go.But perhaps the most vexing problem these caregivers and their children must confront is the sticky web of social expectations and stereotypes – particularly because most of the nonparents are much older than the parents. In fact, about 60 percent of these nonparents are grandparents, like Macur.Switching roles

Those grandparents once coddled and spoiled their grandchildren by letting them stay up late or giving them presents. But now that they're acting as parents, they must discipline the kids by making them go to bed, or do their homework.

“Grandparents want to be the ones to offer a lollipop,” says Reynolds of RAPP. “But now they're the ones who have to make their kids eat their peas.”

“This is my grandson,” Macur says simply about Cameron, “who I'm trying to raise as a son.”They also have to devote less time to their true grandchildren – as Macur has found with his grandchildren Abby,13, and Noah, 5.

“I can't buy Noah something that Cameron doesn't have because Cameron would go crazy,” he says.

“I raised three on my own, too,” says grandmother Daisy Garcia, who's now caring for her granddaughter, Linette Rivera. Linette plays her viola as they wait for the Relatives as Parents Program support group meeting on March 5 in Middletown.Photo: Dawn J. Benko/For the Times Herald-Record

These kids and their often older caregivers must also endure the stares and taunts of other kids and parents, like the young moms who glared at big, gray-haired Ray Macur when he came to pick up Cameron at elementary school. Or the boy being raised by his aunt and uncle who tried to break up a fight between two kids, one of whom was being taunted because his parents were divorcing. When the kid raised by his aunt and uncle butted in, one of the fighting kids yelled back, “At least I have a mother.”

And how can Macur – who has only texted twice in his life – keep up with the whims and energy of a 9-year-old boy?

Still, those that matter most in this complicated world – the children – seem to be coping.Future concerns

A few weeks ago at a RAPP meeting of caregivers and their kids, Linette played her viola and smiled as her grandmother, Daisy Garcia, beamed.

“And I raised three on my own, too,” Garcia says.

The other night, Cameron took a break from playing and pillow fighting with his 5-year-old cousin Noah – Macur's grandson – to explain how much happier he is.

“Because I have a better family here,” he said in a room full of the Legos and tractors and trucks he likes to play with. “We never went on vacation and I never did things with my mom and dad.”

Still, Ray Macur, 69, and Barbara Howland, 57, worry about something they never thought they'd have to worry about again – the future of their 9-year-old child.

It's a future that they have to help Cameron navigate, through adolescence, through dating, through driving and through who knows what else.

“My concern is, what happens to Cameron if something happens to us,” says Howland. “Cameron's 9 now. He'll be with us 10 years, and Ray will be 80 and I'll be 67. What then?”

sisrael@th-record.com

Facing so many challenges of raising children that aren't their own, caregivers are finding emotional support from groups such as the Relatives as Parents Program. The support group met March 5 at Cornell Cooperative Extension building in Middletown. Photo: Dawn J. Benko/For the Times Herald-Record